


Existential

by Tmae



Category: DragonFable (Video Game)
Genre: 'aspenvale adventurefriends existential horror thing', Gen, I am unsure whether or not this qualifies as existential horror tbh, I say I'm not sure if it qualifies as existential horror, I wonder if anyone will be able to guess exactly which line, Second Person Narration, Unreliable Narrator, but its working title was literally, hmmmm what else is a necessary tag...., is the one that is the ENTIRE REASON I wrote this fic, oh!, so that'll do for a title atm I guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 14:35:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29594265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tmae/pseuds/Tmae
Summary: Aspenvale Academy is a good school.It feels a little redundant to say that becauseof courseFalconreach’s premiere adventuring academy is a good school but, still, you feel it should be said all the same. It’s a good school. You haven’t been here long but you can already tell. Actually, you can tellbecauseyou haven’t been here long. You’re the new kid and already you feel at home! Teachers and students alike have been more than welcoming. You belong here. It takes an impressive school to make the new kid feel so settled in in under…Under…How long have you been here?
Comments: 7
Kudos: 21





	Existential

**Author's Note:**

> SO. ADVENTUREFRIENDS, HUH.
> 
> I really hoped I'd finish this before part two dropped but w/e, at least I had it all written before I _played_ part two.

Aspenvale Academy is a good school.

It feels a little redundant to say that because _of course_ Falconreach’s premiere adventuring academy is a good school but, still, you feel it should be said all the same. It’s a good school. You haven’t been here long but you can already tell. Actually, you can tell _because_ you haven’t been here long. You’re the new kid and already you feel at home! Teachers and students alike have been more than welcoming. You belong here. It takes an impressive school to make the new kid feel so settled in in under…

Under…

How long have you been here?

You’re the new kid. You’ve been the new kid for a really long time now, it feels like, but it can’t have been _that_ long or you wouldn’t still be new-

(it’s okay)

(everything is fine)

(don’t worry about it)

It feels like you’ve been the new kid for a while now but, then, that’s just what school is like, isn’t it?

It drags on and on and feels like aeons but really, it’s only been half an hour.

That’s all it is.

Aspenvale Academy is like any other school, after all.

* * *

Something is wrong.

(everything is fine)

You come to school. You spend time with your classmates. You learn how to be an adventurer and it’s fascinating and fulfilling and exactly what you want to be studying. Except, of course, you don’t actually have fun in class because that’s not how school works. Who actually _enjoys_ school except for nerds and people like Jaania, who’s held the student council president title basically forever?

Exactly. Nobody.

So, you don’t have fun in class unless you’re passing notes or whispering or otherwise goofing off behind the teacher’s back because you’re not a nerd, you’re the new kid.

* * *

You go home at night and you wake up the next day and come back and you sit in the same classroom you always do with the same classmates you always do and you can’t help wondering why it feels odd that you’re all the same age.

You go home at night.

…don’t you?

You must but…

What does your house look like? What do you do outside of school?

This isn’t normal.

(yes it is)

Something is wrong.

(no it isn’t)

(nothing is wrong)

(everything is fine)

Man, these classes must be really melting your brain if you’re forgetting your own hobbies!

* * *

Aspenvale Academy’s hallways are both bustling and empty, as they always are. Students coming and going but always enough space to stand and have a conversation comfortably if you want to.

You need to get your copy of _Fundamentals of Hitting Things Very Hard_ from your locker before class starts. You feel like it’s a little silly to have so many textbooks for theory when adventuring is such a hands-on career but, hey, not knowing stuff is why you’re a student!

You hear something that sounds like a commotion and pull your head out of your locker to investigate.

Tomix laughs, bright and clear, the corners of his eyes crinkling.

There’s a _whoosh_ of displaced air as he runs past you, then a metallic _thud_ as he plants a hand against someone’s locker to aid him in skidding around the corner. The altest unfortunate victim of one of his pranks is hot on his heels, hair sopping wet but the scowl clearly at least half fake.

Something in your heart swells. You get along well with all of your classmates, of course, but of everyone in this school, Tomix has always seemed the most… _alive._

…why is your face wet?

(you’ve missed him so much)

(what harm could it really do, if you stayed a little while longer?)

(don’t you deserve this, after everything? isn’t this nice, seeing his face, hearing his voice?)

You reach up to swipe at your wet cheeks and notice that the door to the Home Ec classroom down the hall is open. Someone must be cutting onions.

* * *

You discover in class that the latest victim of one of Tomix’s pranks had, in fact, been Ash. You discover this because his hair and the shoulders of his blazer are still visibly damp and also he keeps glaring at Tomix when Professor Warlic isn’t looking.

Still, just like the scowl in the hall, you can tell that it’s not all the way serious. He’ll get over it soon. Or the two of them will work things out. Probably before the day is over.

That’s the thing about school, really. All the conflicts that feel important to world-ending right now are oh-so-simple when you step back to look at them. Nice and simple. That’s how it works, in school. It won’t be like that when you’re out in the world and real adventurers. That’s when the real battles will start. Real battles with real stakes. The battles that aren’t simple or silly or easily resolved in one afternoon-

You can’t wait for the real battles! It’s going to be so much fun!

(blood and fire and death and loss and _why, why, why-)_

(stop)

(don’t think)

* * *

This isn’t normal.

(yes it is)

People are different. The world isn’t as it should be. You say _Good morning, Mister Warlic!_ and the title trips awkwardly off your tongue.

Something’s wrong.

(Everything’s fine.)

**Author's Note:**

> :3c


End file.
